Hear me now oh thou bleak and unbearable world
Thou art base and debauched as can be
And a knight with his banners all bravely unfurled
Now hurls down his gauntlet to thee!
I am I, Don Quixote, the Lord of La Mancha
Destroyer of Evil am I,
I will march to the sound of the trumpets of glory
Forever to conquer or die
Hear me heathens and wizards and serpents of sin
All your dastardly doings are past
For a holy endeavor is now to begin
And virtue shall triumph at last!

Saturday, March 11, 2006

Milosevic Is Dead

Justice is feeling a little bit cheated today because Serbian despot, Slobodan Milosevic, is dead. He died in his prison cell in The Hague. His lawyer suspects poisoning, but no official cause of death has been determined. Milosevic, 64, has suffered from high blood pressure and heart problems. On Feb. 24, the tribunal refused Milosevic's request to be temporarily released to Moscow in order to undergo medical treatment. In a trial that started on Feb. 12, 2002, Milosevic faced 66 charges of war crimes, including genocide for his role in the Balkan wars following the breakup of the Yugoslav federation in the 1990s.

"The death of Slobodan Milosevic, a few weeks before the completion of his trial, will prevent justice to be done in his case," said Carla del Ponte, chief prosecutor in The Hague at the United Nations war crimes tribunal.

Defying the break-up of Yugoslavia, Serbia was put on the world map by Milosevic in a brutal and barbaric manner. Using an age old hatred of Muslims developed over centuries of vicious Ottoman rule, and a newly found violent nationalism, the Serbs commenced a decade of "ethnic cleansing". Thousands were raped, murdered, burned, chased into exile, and the countryside was devastated all under the thin guise of democracy. He was dubbed "The Butcher of the Balkins."Wiretapped phone conversations show Milosevic to be a run-of-the-mill, garden variety despot, just another tin-pot banana republic dictator without bananas. He was harassed by his domineering wife and spoiled children, hounded by ingratiating yes-men, and pumped up by a polite phone call from Bill Clinton, President of the United States of America aboard Air Force One.Believing himself to be the equal of prominent world leaders, in 1995 Milosevic signed the Dayton Peace Accord in Paris. The Dayton Accords ended the Bosnian War which was only one of the useless wars Milosevic had started but was unable to finish leaving more thousands of people dead, destitute, and desperate.

Finally, the desperate people of Bosnia, in a popular revolt brought down the Milosevic dictatorship on October 5, 1995. After a 36 hour siege of his villa in Belgrade six months later, he surrendered in the wee small hours of April 1.

The life of Indigo Red is full of adventure. Tune in next time for the Further Adventures of Indigo Red.